Field of the Embodiments of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention relate generally to human-device interfaces and, more specifically, to techniques for generating multiple listening environments via auditory devices.
Description of the Related Art
In various situations, people often find a need or desire to engage in a private conversation while in the presence of one or more other people. For example, and without limitation, a person participating in a conference meeting could receive an important phone call during the meeting. In order to prevent disruption of the meeting, the person could choose to physically leave the room or not take the call. In another example, and without limitation, a person riding in a vehicle could desire to initiate a telephone call while maintaining privacy with respect to other passengers or to avoid disrupting conversation among the other passengers. In such a case, the person could initiate the call and speak in a hushed voice or defer the call until a later time when the call could be made in private. In yet another example, and without limitation, the main conversation in a group meeting could give rise to a need for a sidebar meeting among a subset of the group meeting participants. In such a case, the subset of participants could adjourn to another meeting room, if another meeting room is available, or could defer the sidebar meeting until later.
One potential problem with these approaches is that an important or necessary conversation may be detrimentally deferred until a later time, or the main conversation may be disrupted by the second conversation. Another potential problem with these approaches is that the second conversation may not enjoy the desired level of privacy or may be conducted in whispers, making the conversation difficult to understand by the participants.
As the foregoing illustrates, a new technique to accommodate multiple conversations simultaneously would be useful.